


Sally on Strike

by twinfang



Category: 3rd Rock from the Sun
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Family, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-12
Updated: 2020-12-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 19:54:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,856
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28022757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/twinfang/pseuds/twinfang
Summary: In which Sally learns the joys of feminism, and Dick, Harry, and Tommy learn to fend for themselves. Of course, none of this goes well. Blame Albright.
Kudos: 2





	Sally on Strike

"I have to go," Sally said, scrambling to her feet, swiping everything into her purse off the table. Lipstick went rolling across the floor but there was no time to gather up makeup stragglers. "I have to make dinner for the boys, you know," she said, in a forced perky tone, as if there were no greater joy on earth. Of course the reality was that she had no desire whatsoever to slave over a hot microwave for an hour only to have the boys complain that she hadn't taken the plastic wrap off the top again. _Everybody's a critic._  
  
"You'll never see me running like that for a man," Nina said, crossing her legs and folding her arms with considerable attitude. "If you could call Dr. Solomon that." Mary shot her a frustrated look, but seemed to agree. She leaned across the table.  
  
"Sally, I think you could benefit from reading this book I just finished, about empowered modern women. About how we don't have to be slaves to these stereotypical female roles," Mary explained, drawing the book out of her bag. Sally looked down at it, frowning.  
  
"Female roles? Oh! You mean like killing anything that threatens the safety of my family with my bare hands?" she asked flatly. Nina's eyebrows shot up, but Mary continued unabated, waving a hand.  
  
"No, no, Sally. All that stuff's fine," she said. "Cooking. Cleaning. Shopping." She paused. "Ok, keep shopping."  
  
"Dusting," Nina chimed in. "I hate dusting. Show me a man who loves to dust, and I'll book the honeymoon suite right now."  
  
"Exactly," Mary said, "Sally, you should feel free to find yourself a job if that's what you want. It's a big wide world out there. Don't confine yourself to what _Dick_ and _Harry_ want you to do for _them_. Figure out what they can do for _you_ and even more importantly..." Mary grabbed the book and flipped through it until she found the appropriate page. She jabbed the passage with a finger triumphantly. "What _you_ can do for you."  
  
Sally looked more than a little bit unsure about this. Being the woman _was_ her job. It was her mission. She didn't want to screw it up, because, as a soldier, following orders correctly was what she _lived_ for. But if the modern woman had been entirely redefined while she wasn't looking, and she was no longer fulfilling her duty... well then she _had_ to figure out what she was doing wrong and adapt. She snatched the book from Albright.  
  
"Ohh," she said, flipping through it. "It's like a _manual_."  
  
"Well, sort of," Mary said wryly. "Despite what men may think, women don't have a simple on and off switch." Nina joined her in an outburst of laughter at that, and moments later Sally followed suit, though she didn't get the joke.  
  
"Like the Clapper," Sally said, with a large oblivious smile. This quickly killed Nina and Mary's laughter as they shared a confused glance.  
  
"Sure," Mary said, not wanting to argue, and taking another drink again. "Just like the damned Clapper."  
  
Pleased with herself, Sally slipped the book into her purse, and took a moment to bend down and pick up the lipstick tube. She was feeling more empowered already.  
  
"Go get 'em tiger," Mary cackled as Sally headed out the door.

"Do you really think this is a good idea? I feel like this is just going to cause her and Dr. Solomon to get in a fight," Nina cautioned.  
  
"That's the idea," Mary said, throwing her drink back. "Maybe then he'll forget I agreed to go to dinner with him this weekend."  
  
"You're one sneaky bitch," Nina commented, looking impressed.  
  
"One of the best, and don't you forget it."  
  
\----------------  
  
Three plastic wrapped dinners, still frozen solid, plunked down on the table in front of the boys. Tommy, knife and fork in hand stared down at it, his expression dropping immediately.  
  
"What the crap is this?"  
  
Harry, on the other hand, made a sound of pleasant surprise. "Oooo... " He glanced at the others, happily. "It's extra _foggy_ today." He plunged his fork straight through the plastic wrap and took a big bite of frozen, plastic covered noodles. After a moment of reflective chewing, he swallowed with some effort as the others stared. "That's the stuff," he said.  
  
Dick, however, looked less than pleased.  
  
"Lieute _nant_!" he demanded. Slowly, Sally came striding back into the kitchen from where she had disappeared immediately into the living room, book in hand.  
  
"What," she said, evincing little concern.  
  
"This is _un_ acceptable," he said, in the way he said almost everything else - as if the world revolved around him. "Take it away, and make it edible."  
  
"No," she said, really liking the sound of the word. She decided to do it again, because it felt so nice. "Suck it."  
  
Dick let out an unnecessarily loud gasp of disbelief, and all three of them turned to look at her.  
  
"Funny," Tommy said. "Real funny. Haha, we've all had a good laugh. Now can we eat?"  
  
"Sure, Tommy," she said sweetly, "Whenever one of you makes dinner."  
  
There was a tense pause. Then Dick stood up sharply, throwing his tiny paper napkin down angrily. Except that it sort of just wafted lazily to the table, not heavy enough to really sink to the table dramatically as he'd wanted. He picked up a fork and then threw _that_ down, so that the effect would not be lost. It clattered noisily to his great satisfaction.  
  
"Lieutenant, I _order_ you to make dinner, and to like it, dammit."  
  
Sally took her time stepping over to the table, and then leaned with both hands on the edge of it, looking between the 3 of them.  
  
"No," she said, enunciating clearly.  
  
A string of sounds that were simply gibbering mishmash flew out of Dick's mouth, before he settled on squawking out "You can't do that" in a tone a bit like a frightened chicken. "I am your superior officer."  
  
"No, Dick," she said complacently. "You're a man. And as such, you're not the boss of me." Tommy and Harry exchanged looks. "Know who is the boss of me?" she continued, in the same zen tone. When they didn't answer, she just nodded, and pointed at herself. "That's right. This guy right here. And I say I'm going to go in there, watch some game shows, and _you_ are going to make your own damn dinners, from now on." She stood up so that she was facing Dick with her formidable height, hands in fists at her sides. She thrust her chin up at him. "And," she added. "You're gonna like it."

With that, she swept out fo the room imperiously, and they all gawked after her.  
  
"No offense," Tommy said, obviously impressed, "but I think she totally kicked your butt right there, sir..."  
  
" _There will be no discussion of this_ ," Dick said quickly, to cover his wounded pride. "Now Harry, make us some damn dinner."  
  
Harry, plastic wrap protruding from the sides of his mouth, looked up from his now empty tray. "Huh?"  
  
\---------------------  
  
In the flickering light of Leno, Sally sat on the couch, one leg thrown over the edge revealing combat boots. She was dressed in loose fitting camo, her hair pulled back in a messy ponytail, no makeup on, and a bowl of popcorn in her lap. She'd scrawled "WOMYN ONLY" on the side of the bowl with a permanent marker.  
  
Dick was glaring at her from his sofa pointedly. It wasn't doing a damned thing which only made him glare harder. Finally, he threw down the newspaper he had and got to his feet.  
  
"Dammit, Lieutenant, when I glare at you, you'd better listen!"  
  
Sally's hand halted in front of her open mouth. "Excuse me?" she said. "I don't have to take your condescending male tone. I'm an empowered woman, Dick."  
  
"This place is a pigsty," he said, obviously not caring _what_ she thought she was. "Nothing's been washed, nothing's been dusted, nothing's been cooked - we're all living on what we can find in _cereal boxes_. Harry's eaten 5 plastic toys already, and I'll be damned if I'll let him have the next one. I want it," he said defensively.  
  
"I'm doing you a _favor_ , Dick. What if some day all the women in the world just got up and left? All you men would be left starving and sitting around in your own juices that you don't know how to clean up. It's a new world, and it's a _dusty_ world, Dick. Deal with it." She ate the popcorn, to punctuate her point.  
  
"Then you're off the mission," Dick said firmly, picking his newspaper back up and opening it with a crack.  
  
Sally dropped the popcorn bowl, which spilled its contents to the floor, where she wouldn't have to pick them up. " _What?"_  
  
"You heard me, _ex-_ Lieutenant," he said petulantly turning a page.  
  
"You can't do that," she said, rising to her feet and pointing a finger at him. "I'm doing my _job_. This is what modern women are like... just as useless as modern men."  
  
"You are not performing satisfactorially. It is not simply your job to emulate earth women." He paused. Ok, dammit, that _was_ her job. Think, think, think. ".... You also have to cook for us. It's in your mission briefing." As often happened, when he lied, Dick's tongue rolled around in his mouth and his eyes drifted upward and to the side, to avoid contact with her.  
  
"No it wasn't. I would remember. I'm not going to forget something like my _mission_ briefing, Dick." Sally was getting pissed.  
  
"Well, it was," he said, childishly. "You must have missed it."  
  
"So I'm no longer on the mission, is that it?"  
  
"Right."  
  
"Ok. Fine," she said, as if it didn't bother her at all. "Then there's nothing stopping me from doing _this_ ," she said, and threw herself at him much in the manner of a professional wrestler.  
  
\--------------------------  
  
The four of them sat out on the roof, gazing at the stars and their neighbors who always left the shades up. Dick's arm was in a sling and he had a distinctly black eye. Sally had lost the combat boots and camo. There seemed to have been a peace reached between them.  
  
"You know," Sally said, tapping Albright's book against her knee. "Giving up all that girly stuff isn't all this book cracks it up to be. I forgot that it meant _I_ wouldn't have any dinner either."  
  
"Or that you'd have to use the grody bathroom too," Tommy added.  
  
"Or that your human body was severely allergic to dust," Harry said, trying to contribute.  
  
"No it's not," Sally said.  
  
"Withdrawn."  
  
"But you know," Sally mused, draping an arm over a knee. "What I missed the _most_? .... Beating the living daylights out of people. You know. Girl stuff." She clapped Dick on the shoulder and he let out a bloodcurdling yell of pain.  
  
The others all shared a pleasant laugh and Sally tossed the book off the roof.  
  
"I thought that was Mary's," Tommy said.  
  
"You're ruining the moment."

**Author's Note:**

> From song prompt: "Playing God" by Paramore. Written 9/22/10.


End file.
